Bag with handle



FIG.3

FIG.5

INVENTOR.

ROBERT R. GLASS gy kw ATTORNEY May 8, 1962 R. R. GLASS BAG WITH HANDLE Filed Feb. 7, 1956 FIG.

United States Patent 3,033,438 Patented May 8, 1962 ice 3,033,433 BAG WITH HANDLE Robert R. Glass, Spring Hill Road, Westport, Conn., assignor, by mesne assignments, of fifty percent to Edward Maltz, New York, N.Y.

Filed Feb. 7, 1956, Ser. No. 563,957 1 Claim. (Cl. 229-54) This invention relates to bags with handles and to the method of making the same, and relates more particularly to an improved bag handle having considerably greater strength at the point of attachment than do conventional handles.

An objectof the present invention is to provide a bag with a handle of unusual strength'andwhich is adaptable for bags of cement or the like where the con-tents weigh in the range of IOOlbs. or thereabouts;

Handles for paper shopping bags which are designed 'f orcarrying relatively light loads are common in the art' and the U-shaped length of twisted paper or other handle forming material is, usually affixed to short sections of tape by staples or adhesive, and the strips then secured to the inner or outer walls of the bag.

Heavy bags of cement, feed and other materials present different problems since the weight of the contents is so great that the handles generally pull away from their anchorage. Bags for these materials are generally made from three plies of heavy paper and if a greater strength is required more plies may be employed. An advantage in having several plies resides in the fact that if one of the bags should leak there are two more to protect the contents against moisture and spillage. Attaching a handle of any character by any means whatsoever to one of the plies of this type of bag is totally useless.

Another important object of the present invention is to provide a bag consisting of a plurality of plies of material, each forming a complete bag, to one of the plies of which a novel handle strip is adhesively secured, or as in most instances, two handle strips, one on each side of the bag in opposed relation so that both handles can be grasped by the hand of the person carrying the same.

The strip is made from sheet material such as paper of considerably greater tensile strength than the paper used in forming'the bag elements and the U-shaped handle is secured to the strip by novel means hereinafter described. The handle strip is then adhesively secured to the multi-wall bag in an area Where the plies have been adhesively secured together during formation of the bag on a conventional multi-wall bag making machine. Alternately the plies may be bonded together at the time the handle strip is bonded to the bag.

The handle strip is first coated on one side thereof with a layer of thermoplastic adhesive. The Web of paper with the dried adhesive on one face thereof is fed to a machine for applying the handle-forming paper rope or cord to this face in proper position and heat and pressure are applied to the uncoated side of the strip in the area only of the legs of the U-shaped handle, said legs being backed up by a suitable plate during application of the heat. This secures one face of the handle to the strip which is now severed from the web and is moved to a second station. At this station two strips of heavy paper about one inch in width and having a thermo-plastic coating on one face thereof are applied to the opposite face of the handle with the adhesive surfaces face to face. These securing strips extend from the upper to the lower edges of the handle strips.

A novel heated, resilient presser plate now engages the securing strips and presses them firmly around the remaining faces of the handle rope, and the margins of the securing strip on each side of the handle rope are firm- 1y bonded to the handle strip. Only the thermo-plastic material on the handle strip which is in the immediate area of the handle rope and the narrow securing strips have been activated, thus leaving large areas of the handle strip free to be adhesively applied to the bag.

The handle strips with the handles securely ailixed thereto are now applied to opposite sides of one longitudinal edge of the bag at the center thereof, and the bag is now ready for filling.

In the drawing:

PEG. 1 is a side elevation of a bag and handle of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is abroken section taken on line 2-2 of FIG. 1.

FIG. 3 is a brokcn side elevation of a length of the strip and the handle firmly secured thereto by the secur ing strip.

FIG. 6 is a broken section showing the method of fixing the securing strip to the handle strip with the securing strip wrapped firmly around the periphery of the handle cord.

In the drawing certain elements of a machine used in forming the bag handle of the present invention are shown schematically.

The first step in forming the bag handle is shown in FIG. 3 and it consists in securing the handle cord 10, which is formed from lengths of twisted kraft paper handle cord, to a handle strip 11. This handle strip is preferably made of fibrous material and may be formed from kraft paper or cloth of considerable tensile strength. Each strip is cut from a web of about 2 inches in width after the handle has been initially secured thereto. Each strip may be about 8 inches in length The web has an over-all coating on one side thereof of a thermo-plastic material, preferably a vinyl emulsion adhesive such as No. 30:38 Resyn adhesive of National Starch Products Co. This adhesive comprises approximately polysome water and ammonia to maintain the latex dispersion and includes suitable solvents such as carbon tetrachlo ride. a

in the coating of the handle strip with this type of adhesive it is possible and, moreover, it is preferred to employ an extremely thin coating of the adhesive. This coating may be so thin, in fact, that after the handle strip has been heat secured as hereinafter described, on loosening of the strip by water soaking and redrying it in situ, a marked reduction or absence of adhesive quality is found. Nevertheless I have discovered that with such extremely thin coating of the adhesive, when the handle strip is applied in the manner hereafter described, an extremely strong bond is elfected between the handle strip and the bag.

After the strip has been coated thinly with the adhesive it is thoroughly dried, this procedure taking one or two minutes, and it is then non-tacky and can be rolled or stored for any desired length of time before use. When used the strip is fed from the roll to the aflixing machine where it is severed into the proper lengths either before or after the handle 10 has been secured to the adhesive side thereof.

FIG. 3 shows one leg of the handle cord 10 overlying the handle strip 11 and this handle may be fed through a tube 12 and the other end bent back to overlie a portion of the strip farther to the right. The handle strip is then severed from the roll. Means for guiding the handle cord may be a grooved backing-up shoe shown in FIG. 4. This figure shows the method of initially securing the handle cord to the handle strip 11. The backing-up shoe 13 has a groove 14 which receives the cord 10. A heating bar 15 engages the adhesive-free face of the handle strip 11 and presses the adhesive face of the strip firmly against the cord, flattening it slightly. This heating bar may have an electrical heating coil therein with suitable terminals connected to a source of heating current and thus constitutes a hot iron to heat-activate the adhesive by conduction through strip 11. If desired, an induction heating apparatus may be employed for this purpose. The bar is located in a recess 16 in a plate 17 and after the application of heat and pressure the cord is somewhat flattened and this flattened surface is firmly bonded to the narrow area of the handle strip which it overlies.

The handle strip carrying the handle is now moved to a second station for application of a handle securing strip 20 to each leg of the cord. This securing strip may be one inch or thereabouts in width and may be formed from the same material as handle strip 11 and have the same adhesive coating on one face thereof.

The strip is cut to a length equal to the distance between the upper and lower edges of handle strip 11 and when in place over the cord a heated die presses the securing strip around the remaining periphery of the cord. This step is shown in FIG. 6 and the handle strip 11 engages a backing-up shoe 22 while the adhesive surfaces of the handle and securing strips are in face-to-face engagement. The die may include a heated backing plate 24 and a block of silicone rubber 25. In its initial state this block is flat and it is moved into engagement with cord 10 covered by the securing strip. As the pressure is applied the portion of the rubber die overlying the cord is compressed and assumes the contour of FIG. 6 and the central portion 26 of the securing strip is firmly bonded to the cord whilst the opposed margins 27 are bonded to the adhesive face of the handle strip.

This operation does not activate the thermoplastic adhesive on each side of margins 27. The handle strip is now ready for application to the bag, one of such strips being on each side of the bag 30 shown in FIGS. 1 and 2.

This is a multi-walled bag and as shown consists essentially of three completely formed bags, including an innermost bag 31, an intermediate bag 32 and an outermost bag 33. The usual practice is to form the three bags simultaneously without, however, adhering one bag to the other. In accordance with the present invention, however, the three plies are adhesively secured together in the area indicated by broken line 34 in FIG. 1. The application of this adhesive is done at the time of forming the bags and they are securely laminated together.

The handle strip is now secured to the outermost wall by heat and pressure and the die (not shown) which is used to activate the thermo-plastic adhesive has voids in the areas defined by securing strips 20 since the latter have no adhesive faces to be activated. If the bag forming machine is one incapable of handling the wet adhesive in the areas where the plies are secured together, a thermo-plastic adhesive may be used at the time of forming the bag and the heat and pressure employed to bind the handle strip will also bond the plies together.

While there have been described herein what are at present considered preferred embodiments of the invention, it will be obvious to those skilled in the art that many modifications and changes may be made therein without departing from the essence of the invention. It is therefore to be understood that the exemplary embodiments are illustrative and not restrictive of the invention, the scope of which is defined in the appended claim, and that all modifications that come within the meaning and range of equivalency of the claim are intended to be included therein.

What I claim is:

A bag of flexible material and provided with a carrying handle secured thereto on a wall thereof, said handle including an elongated handle strip provided on one face thereof with an overall coating of thermo-plastic adhesive, an inverted U-shaped handle cord whose legs are secured on one side thereof to the adhesive side of said handle strip, and narrow handle securing strips extending from the upper to the lower edges of the handle strip and provided on one face thereof with an all-over coating of thermo-plastic adhesive overlying said legs and being firmly adhesively secured around the remaining periphery of the legs and to the margins of the handle strip on each side thereof by the application of heat and pressure, the areas of the handle strip lying between the ban dle securing strips and lying beyond said handle securing strips being adhesively secured to the wall of the bag by the application of heat and pressure and the areas of the handle strip covered by the handle securing strips being free and unsecured.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS Re. 21,228 Steen Oct. 3, 1939 1,520,071 Nestor Dec. 23, 1924 2,060,451 Steen Nov. 10, 1936 2,348,964 Dodson May 16, 1944 2,469,536 Winesett May 10, 1949 2,493,348 Hoppe Jan. 3, 1950 FOREIGN PATENTS 54,256 Denmark Jan. 17, 1938 

